Legal Services
PLEA's Legal Team
MICHAEL NAPIER Founded the Law Offices of Michael Napier P.C. and has been representing Phoenix Police Officers for over 32 years. Mr. Napier is one of the most experienced labor and personal injury attorneys in Arizona. Mr. Napier has represented hundreds of officers before administrative bodies throughout Arizona, and has assisted critically injured officers as well as survivors of officers in obtaining compensation for their injuries and losses.
ADDITIONAL MEMBERS OF THE LEGAL TEAM
JANET FELTZ was admitted to practice law in Arizona in 1985. Prior to joining the firm in 2005, she served as an administrative hearing officer for 20 years in disciplinary and other employment matters on behalf of merit boards and commissions throughout the State. She also served as an administrative law judge for the Arizona Department of Economic Security from 2001-2005.
ANTHONY COURY has focused his 9 years of practice primarily on personal injury and wrongful death lawsuits in which he has served as plaintiffs counsel. He has experience in cases dealing with dram shop liability, negligence, governmental claims, and product liability including service as counsel on the litigation team for Phoenix Police Officer Jason Schchterle.
KATHRYN BAILLIE was born and reared in Phoenix Arizona, completing her undergraduate degree at Arizona State University. She served as a J.A. for the Third Circuit Court and then worked as a Public Defender in the Commonwealth of Kentucky before joining the Law Office of Michael Napier P.C. She has worked with Mr. Napier on personal injury and wrongful death cases, dram shop liability, negligence, administrative, disciplinary, and other employment matters.
JAMES P. ABDO was born in Omaha, Nebraska. He earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Rochester in 1984 and his Juris Doctorate from the College of Law at Arizona State University in 1991. Mr. Abdo served as an Assistant Attorney General for Arizona before entering private practice as a partner at two major Phoenix law firms, where his practice focused on commercial litigation of all types. He has extensive experience both representing government bodies appearing before numerous state, county and city agencies in numerous licensing, procurement and labor/employment matters. His practice also includes the formation, counseling and representation of business entities, the drafting of a wide variety of real estate and other contract documents in addition to litigating disputes arising out of contracts.
ADDITIONAL LEGAL SERVICES
In addition to the full services provided to PLEA members to protect their careers, tha Law Office of Michael Napier P.C. provides the following:
Personal Injury Recovery (on or off duty), experienced representation at a reduced fee; Reduced Fees for matters not covered by the PLEA legal plan;
Free Probate of officers estate for line of duty death; Free consultations to members on any matter, and Referrals to attorneys or specialists for matters not handled by the firm.
LOCATION AND CONTACT INFORMATION
LAW OFFICES OF MICHAEL NAPIER P.C.
2525 E. Arizona Biltmore Circle, Suite 130
Phoenix, AZ 85016
(602) 248-9107
www.napierlawfirm.com
CLICK HERE to see the comparison on legal services between PLEA and the FOP/ALC
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CLICK HERE to see the difference that PLEA's legal team makes.
Orders Of Protection
On Monday, January 28 your Association supported a PLEA member at hearing in Superior Court in reference to appealing an order of protection that caused the forfeiture of a duty weapon. At this hearing, the judge modified the order and allowed the return of the weapon. Because our weapon is a vital "tool” in our job, and understanding that some court actions initiated against officers are vindictive in nature and without merit, PLEA has proposed the following protection for police officers at negotiations:
A unit member who is served with an order of protection/injunction prohibiting harassment will not be terminated solely because of the issuance of the court order.
Members will be advised of economic issues that are to be discussed in the upcoming weeks.
The Defense of Dan Lovelace
By Craig Mehrens, Mehrens & Wilemon, Phoenix, AZ
Chandler police officer Dan Lovelace responded to a priority one call, forged prescription in progress, on October 11, 2001 at approximately 3 p.m. in the afternoon. He was the first officer to arrive at the scene on his motorcycle and he parked his bike in front of Ms. Nelson who was in the outside drive-thru bay of a Walgreen's pharmacy (Officer Lovelace could tell that Ms. Nelson was engaged in conversation with the pharmacist and felt that parking his bike in front and blocking her was not unsafe at that moment).
He approached Ms. Nelson and politely asked for identification. She said she had none, although her purse was clearly visible in the seat. He then told her his purpose and said that he thought that this matter would be cleared up shortly, but that he noticed that her license plate was down as he approached her car (clearly giving him more information that she was involved in this crime). He asked that she remove the keys from her car, place them on the dash, which she did. He then went to the back of the car to put her license plate up. As he did so and was calling in the plate number, and began walking back toward the driver's side in the empty bay, Ms. Nelson put the keys in the ignition, and started her car.
Officer Lovelace ran to the front of the median, i.e., the forward left fender of her car and ordered her to cease this activity. She then moved forward and he again continued his police commands. She then ran into his bike and took a sharp left turn into Officer Lovelace, leaving approximately 29 feet of skid. Officer Lovelace believed he was being compressed between the building and the planter and unfortunately decided he had to shoot to stop this lethal threat. He aimed for center mass and fired. Ms. Nelson was killed almost instantly and her car decelerated to approximately 5 miles an hour where Officer Marty Thompson's vehicle came in contact with it, fully stopping it.
Officer Lovelace raced after the car and called in "shot fired, roll medics, one shot to the chest". Then Officer Lovelace opened the door to remove Ms. Nelson to perform CPR, he noticed that his shot had not entered her chest but actually had entered slightly to the rear of her upper left arm.Maricopa County Attorney, Rick Romley, came to the hasty conclusion that this was a "bad shoot" and hired an outside ballistics expert. This expert was given misinformation and came to the erroneous conclusion that Officer Lovelace could not have fired the shot as he had relayed it. (Officer Lovelace had given a thorough taped interview on the evening of October 11, 2001 and had conducted a taped walk-through with investigators.)
Mr. Romley went to the grand jury, obtained an indictment and arrested Officer Lovelace. An hour or so later he held a full press conference telling the public of what a fabulous job he had done for this community.Fortunately for Officer Lovelace, he was a member of the Chandler Law Enforcement Association, which had an agreement with the Legal Defense Fund to defend officers accused of crimes while on duty. LDF retained our office to represent Officer Lovelace. Our first tactic was to point out to the Judge what a slanted/faulty job the prosecution had done in presenting their case to the grand jury. The trial court agreed and remanded the case, ordering that the county attorney hold a second grand jury investigation. The county attorney did so and the second grand jury refused to indict.
Mr. Romley was not satisfied with that conclusion and filed direct information with the trial court, again charging Officer Lovelace with second-degree murder. A jury trial was commenced in May of 2004 and a verdict was rendered on July 9, 2004 acquitting Officer Lovelace of second-degree murder and the lesser-included offense that the prosecution had requested of manslaughter. He was also acquitted of endangerment as Ms. Nelson had her 18?month?old son in the backseat of her car.
To mount this defense, the Legal Defense Fund authorized our office to hire the necessary experts. Without them a viable defense would have been virtually impossible. We were allowed to hire and have testify at trial the following experts:Dr. Elizabeth Loftus, a world-renown expert on eye witness testimony and memory. Dr. Loftus has written numerous books and articles on the fallibility of memory for over 30 years.Dr. Vincent DiMaio, the chief medical examiner of Bexar County, San Antonio, Texas and the author of Gunshot Wounds, the bible in that area. Dr. William Lewinski, an expert in biomechanics and a behavioral scientist that focuses on police performance in lethal force encounters. Dr. Paul Michel, a forensic optometrist providing expert opinions and legal testimony regarding human vision.Tim Pebler, an accident re-constructionists. A former Arizona Highway Patrolman who had left the patrol to attend engineering school and then devote the rest of his caner to accident re-construction. Mike Bumcrot, a retired Los Angeles Sheriffs detective who has investigated over 100 officer involved shootings and has 34 years of police service, 22 in the homicide bureau. Jan Spaeth, a jury consultant expert who was able to allow us to conduct jury focus groups and to help injury selection. Atheia Hardt, a media consultant.
The jury deliberated for 2 and 3 / 4 days before reaching their unanimous verdict. In addition, the two alternate jurors let us know that they also would have voted not guilty. The atmosphere in police shootings is becoming more and more hostile. Clearly this case had political overtones. The high publicity makes it even more difficult to defend as the media typically takes a slant against the officer. The prosecution tried to take a situation that developed in seconds and then analyze in detail why things went "wrong". As U.S. Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes stated 63 years ago: " Detached reflection cannot be demanded in the presence of an uplifted knife." This was a hard fought victory and without the help and support of LDF, the outcome may well have been different.